OpenAI Revises Pentagon Deal After Backlash
OpenAI is backtracking on its new Pentagon contract, announcing revisions after intense criticism. CEO Sam Altman admitted the deal “looked opportunistic and sloppy,” as reports revealed the company caved to demands for broader AI surveillance use. The move follows a petition by tech workers to reverse the government's blacklisting of competitor Anthropic.
The controversy ignited when Anthropic, a key OpenAI competitor, was blacklisted by the Pentagon after refusing to remove safeguards against its AI being used for mass domestic surveillance and fully autonomous weapons. The Trump administration designated Anthropic a "supply chain risk," a label typically reserved for foreign adversaries, and ordered all federal agencies to cease using its technology. This government-wide ban on Anthropic's Claude AI system followed the breakdown of negotiations over a potential $200 million contract. Anthropic's CEO, Dario Amodei, publicly stated the company could not "in good conscience" agree to the Pentagon's demand for "all lawful purposes" use without explicit restrictions on these key areas. In the wake of Anthropic's blacklisting, OpenAI swiftly announced its own deal with the Pentagon. This move triggered immediate backlash, with critics and hundreds of tech workers from companies including Google and OpenAI signing an open letter in solidarity with Anthropic. The rapid turn of events led to a surge in uninstalls of ChatGPT and a jump in downloads for Anthropic's Claude, which briefly overtook ChatGPT in app stores. In response to the criticism, OpenAI has amended its contract to explicitly prohibit the "intentional" use of its AI for domestic surveillance of U.S. persons, including through the use of commercially acquired data. The revised agreement also stipulates that intelligence agencies, such as the NSA, cannot use OpenAI's services without a separate contract modification. Sam Altman has expressed hope that the Pentagon will offer Anthropic the same revised terms.
